The beginnings of the ice hockey in Germany lie around 1900 in Berlin. An ice hockey-like game was probably played as early as on February 4, 1897 on the Halensee Lake in Berlin. However, this game likely had more in common with the related sport bandy. The participants were Akademischer SC 1893 Berlin and a team of students.

1901 saw the first German club that created its own ice hockey department (the [[Berliner Schlittschuhclub]),. As a consequence, further ice hockey associations or departments developed first in Berlin and then in other large German cities. In 1908 ice hockey was taken up as section of the Deutscher Eissport-Verband. On September 19, 1909, Germany became the sixth member nation of the predecessor organization of the IIHF, the "Ligue International de Hockey sur Glace" (LIHG).

By 1910, when Germany participated in the first European Ice Hockey Championship a city league with ten teams was already playing in Berlin. Beside the Berliner Schlittschuhclub of the BFC Preussen, the teams were the Sportclub Berlin, the Berliner Eislaufverein 1904, the BFC Britania, the Berliner EV 1886, the Hockey Club Berlin, the Sportklub Komet, the SC Charlottenburg and the Eislauf Verein Berlin. In 1912, the first German championships were held, which the Berliner Schlittschuhclub would win.

After the First World War, Germany was excluded from the LIHG in 1920 and could thus not in any LIHG tournaments. On January 11, 1926, the Deutsche Eissport-Verband, the body responsible for ice hockey in Germany, was re-admitted to the LIHG, and Germany was once again able to participate in the European Ice-Hockey championships beginning in 1927.

Until 1940, the development of the ice hockey in Germany made great strides. By the 1932 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, Germany attained the bronze medal, and during the European championships (then a qualifier for the Ice Hockey World Cup) won the European title in 1930 and 1934. The 1936 Winter Olympics saw a contentious issue arise when the Nazi party were forced to include a Jewish player (Rudi Ball) on the team. Ice hockey developed further in this time period with the emergence of new regional organizations across the country.

After the World War II, Germany was again excluded from the LIHG in April 1946. At this time a national league for the best teams, the Oberliga (Ice Hockey), developed in the Federal Republic, while the Soviet occupation zone, the later German Democratic Republic, took its own development. (See Also: Ice Hockey in the DDR)

The Federal Republic of Germany was admitted to the LIGH on March 10, 1951, and the GDR joined as an independent member with the Deutschen Eislauf-Verband der DDR on June 9, 1954.

The Oberliga was replaced 1958 by the reintroduced Ice Hockey Bundesliga, before 1963 the Deutsche Eishockey-Bund was created, which remained under the umbrella of the Deutschen Eissport-Verbandes. Internationally the national team of the FRG created the jump into the A-World Championship, where they could be established end of the 1970s and into the 1980s. However, it never ranked among the top four teams in the world.
In 1901 SC Berlin, became the first German hockey team.

The German men's national ice hockey team first participated in serious international competition at the 1911 European Hockey Championship. When Germany was split after World War II, a separate East German national ice hockey team existed until 1990. By 1991, the East German teams and players were merged into the Deutscher Eishockey-Bund association.

The team is not considered to be as elite as Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden or the United States, but they are ranked 9th in the world by the IIHF. Since re-unification, their best recent results include finishing 6th place at the 2003 World Championships where they lost a close quarter-final match in overtime to Canada, and 4th at the 2010 World Championships where they lost to sweden in the bronze medal game. Previously, they finished third in the European Group and qualified for the quarter-finals at the 1996 World Cup after a surprising 7-1 victory against the Czech Republic. In the 1992 Olympics, they lost to Canada 4-3 in an overtime shoot-out in the quarter-finals.

Germany has never won an international competition, and their most recent medal was bronze in the 1976 Olympic Winter Games. This was their best result as well as a silver medal at the 1930 World Championships.

There are 25,934 registered players in Germany (0.03% of its population).

In December 2005 Uwe Krupp became head coach.

Team Germany finished in 4th place at the 2010 IIHF World Championship, their best placement since 1953.

German U20, U18, Womens, and Womens U18 teams also participate in the world championships.